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Customer-centricity

Embedding it into your organisation’s DNA

Customer expectations and behaviours have changed dramatically over the past decade. Organisations are expected to meet customers’ needs and expectations at every interaction, in return for customer loyalty. The ability to deliver this depends on the extent to which ‘customer-centricity’ is embedded within every single person in your business.

Few organisations have the necessary organisational culture to deliver truly customer-centric customer experiences. Often, a well-intentioned strategy is diluted by operational constraints (whether real or perceived) and a loss of focus, resulting in little more than lip-service being paid to the concept of customer-centricity. Too many organisations focus on trying to deliver ‘world class’ service – rather than giving customers what they actually want, which in most cases is a quick and easy process to follow, that is right first time.

  • There is a disconnect between strategy and vision, and the operational staff and the behaviours that are required to really deliver the customer experience. In our experience, this is usually caused by siloed business units, misaligned reward and recognition packages, and a lack of executive buy-in.
  • Regulatory or other enforced processes are used as an excuse to provide poor customer experiences without considering other experience based principles that can be used to manage and improve the customer experience.
  • Traditional customer feedback is often reviewed days and weeks following the actual event. Digital and online social platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and Blogs are enabling mass feedback to be captured in real-time, and distributed across the business to those responsible to action immediately.
  • Often, non customer-facing business units form the greatest obstacle in preventing a company from becoming truly ustomer-centric. Organisations often over-focus on the frontline service delivery teams, and do not focus on creating the required mindsets, behaviours and processes, within the back and head-office teams.

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